Chapter Text
Two years ago, a savior landed in the kingdom.
The inky black ether of night gave way to a brilliant streak of flame as the union of earth and sky fell from the arms of heaven. Cast onto the empty beach of a desolate isle, a newborn star awoke swaddled in a pristine vessel of clay.
Their arrival had been anticipated by the trapped souls of this world, who slowly emerged from their cold hiding places to welcome the celestial gift. This new child was divinely appointed to free the land of its burdens at last. Destined to take the hand of the lost and lead them home.
But as the spirits danced and sang the child’s praises, the little star was preoccupied. Staring back up at the cosmos from which they’d fallen, the child reached up to the sky with a curious expression, twirling their fingers across the glittering tapestry above. As they drank in the worldly sensations of sand beneath their feet and wind against their skin, something told them to enjoy these last peaceful moments.
The call of destiny saddled their tiny frame with the fate of countless souls.
The little star made no complaints as they toddled across the realms. Climbing through ruins and skipping through battle-torn fields, they were eager to experience everything this strange, diminished world had to offer. Even as the toll of their journey began to make its mark, the child never faltered. Their divine mother’s warm voice always urged them forward, lighting the way like a beacon. Bring the stars home.
They took their first scrapes in stride, brushing theirself off from every fall and tumble beaming with courage. And when they finally stepped from the Vault’s summit scarred and weathered, they had never been more determined to see their purpose through. The spirits seemed pleased with this promising new savior.
The child of light they called the star. The chosen one who would lead them from darkness at last.
No one told the child that they were not the first.
Some argued good intent, to shield the child from a gruesome truth. Others chose to keep their savior from getting discouraged before they could bring salvation. Regardless of their reasoning, the outcome was the same. Crossing the threshold of the mountain at the behest of their mother’s voice, the child found a land that held no secrets.
Their courageous strides slowed to a cautious shuffle as the summit revealed its burden. The path ahead was littered with stone figures in frozen states of agony. They were scarce enough at first to be mistaken for morbid statues; their slumped forms scattered beside the trail, faces hidden in their hands. Some seated, some clutching their chests. Some frozen in eternal sleep. But the higher the child climbed, the more there were. A multitude of bodies, each one a gruesome monument to a journey cut short. The round stone faces of children pulled into mixed expressions of terror, large eyes wide in last minute realization of the end.
The child shielded their face as fierce winds hurled down neverending cascades of shards. Pushing forward blindly through the torrential storm, they finally felt the current grow weaker as they met the resistance of a stone barrier. At this slightest hint of safety they immediately crouched down and made theirself as small as possible to fit inside the stone’s meager protection. The child was relieved to find shelter, realizing they could make it through the winds as long as they found more cover. Much like their journey through the Wasteland, all they needed was to scout the trail ahead and plan the safest route. They let out a shaky breath at the meager consolation of a way forward. They would be home soon. Sneaking a peek past the defensive position of their arms to scan the area, they immediately locked eyes with one of their frozen siblings.
The other child had fallen to their knees halfway behind the boulder. Their head was turned upward, mouth agape in a silent scream. One petrified arm stretched out desperately for the summit. The child reached out to touch the figure, running a tender hand across the injured stone. A large gash ran down their back, which the child could only hope formed after the light had left them.
Pulling their hand away, the child tried to shake the uncanny feeling it gave them to finally see something that looked like them. Of course, it seemed their mother had made the little star’s vessel to resemble the inhabitants of this world—they could wear their masks, their clothes, style their hair the same—but this was different. This may as well have been their twin. Another star. Another child with big dreams and even bigger responsibilities. Perhaps, in another time, they’d drifted together across the sky. Twinkling.
How many had been sent here, doomed to fail?
And then, they were gone.
The child watched in wide-eyed horror as a shard slammed into the tiny body, shattering it in an instant. Every piece was swept up immediately by the cruel winds and scattered in all directions, an entire existence wiped away in mere moments. Not even dust had been left behind by the time a rough scream managed to escape their throat. Nearly every remaining ounce of determination the child had left buckled beneath them.
Trembling, they looked out at the storm with a now visceral awareness of their own fragility. Waiting for even a narrowly safe opening in the neverending onslaught of stones, the child tried desperately not to give in to despair, but the sight had already shaken them to their core. When the roar of the coarse wind finally seemed to pause, the child seized the chance to sprint out from their shelter toward the next boulder further up the path. They wished it had been out of courage, but all that propelled them forward now was the fear of staying in one spot for too long.
Their pace grew much slower as they fearfully continued their ascent. Shards zipped ever closer as their hiding spots became smaller. Though they had the fortune of narrowly missing the largest of them, even the smallest red specks stung as they grazed across the skin. The child winced and gasped as a shallow gash appeared across their arm, now unable to crouch any lower to the ground.
The pain only made them more desperate, and more reckless.
They took a moment to breathe and rolled onto their back, their eyes turned up to the darkened sky to watch the rocks pass overhead. While they waited, they dragged a trembling hand across the gash to brush off the flaking dark embers that crackled and burned into their clay body. Pinching and crumbling a fleck of darkstone between their fingers, the child thought of the large crack that ran up the statue’s back with a shiver.
Above them, the sky grew eerily quiet. The child heaved theirself onto their stomach with a groan and peeked around the corner of their tiny shelter. Nothing.
They waited a bit longer. No rocks.
The child struggled to their knees, then attempted shakily to get to their feet. They slammed back into the ground with a yelp. The storm roared above, the gnashing of stone against stone starting anew further up the mountain. It would have been wise to wait again, but fear had made the child irrational. They stumbled forward onto their hands and knees, switching into a desperate and agonizing crawl to outrun the new wave of stones to a new shelter. Unforgiving stone scraped away at their palms as they clawed forward, pushing on. The next rock was just within reach, just within their grasp—
The feeling of white hot pain flooded their senses. The air grew still as another child fell to the storm.
Unlike their siblings, however, this little star survived.
The light that remained in that mangled and crumbling body could only be called a flicker, but it was enough to get what was left of the child back to shelter. They collapsed heavily against the ground, trembling at the nauseating feeling of wind eating away at their fractured flesh.
For the first time in their short life, the child cried. They clutched their chest and howled painfully at the sky until their throat was raw. It was all so cruelly out of reach. Their destiny. Their home. Their celestial mother, brilliant and golden, whose voice had grown silent.
The screaming wind suffocated their cries.